Commercial Architecture June 2018 - 8

museums

FEATURE

Museums Evolve
To Remain Relevant
Despite social and cultural changes, exhibits continue to attract crowds.
Kenneth W. Betz, Senior Editor

re old-fashioned brick-and-mortar museums still relevant in the digital age?
Has their role changed? Are museums

taking steps to adapt to social and cultural changes? For many museums, the answers are an emphatic "yes."
"We believe that museums in a physical capacity will always be relevant, although we've
witnessed their roles significantly transform over

Whimsical Museum
Focuses On The
Interactive

the past few decades," said Andrew Barwick, RA,
Senior Associate, Cooper Robertson, New York
(cooperrobertson.com).
"It is becoming increasingly critical that museums begin to open up and establish integral
relationships with their surrounding communities, rather than operating as cloistered vessels of
culture. We often see this manifested as a spatial
and programmatic blending between the museum and its surrounding public streetscape. At
the recently completed Whitney Museum of
American Art in New York City, great effort was
made to soften this barrier and allow the public
arena to penetrate as deeply into the ground
floor as possible. Combined with other flexible
plan endeavors, this allows the museum to support a myriad of potential public programming
and activities, anchoring it within its surrounding neighborhood of the Meatpacking District,"
he said.
Creating flexible spaces to better engage museum visitors is one of the changes being seen at
museums around the country. "With recent museum clients, we are more frequently pursuing
flexible spaces and features which support a
range of changing educational and social programs and activities. There is also an increasing
need for museums to more directly engage with
their audiences, which must be supported from
8

COMMERCI A L A RCHI T EC T URE

JUNE 2018

commercialarchitecturemagazine.com

OXI, The Wolf Museum of Exploration + Innovation, Santa

science, innovation, and exploration led the architects to a fresh

Barbara, CA (moxi.org), promotes the spirit of discovery

approach on the inside, with clean-lined, gallery-style spaces for

and creativity within a whimsical, yet rigorously designed

the exhibitions, classrooms, theaters for museum programs, and

building near Santa Barbara's train station and waterfront.

offices for staff.

From the exterior, the museum resembles a sandcastle with

MOXI is located alongside railroad tracks near the city's

a playful tower at the corner and a wavy roofline. The initial

historic train station, at State Street. The museum's footprint is

sandcastle design was by the late architect Barry Berkus, AIA,

configured to accommodate an historic signalman's building next

and served as the basis of the architecture developed by AB

to the tracks that was built as part of the original train-terminal

Design Studio, Santa Barbara (abdesignstudioinc.com). Deep

complex. Next door, to the south, is a 1920s whistle-stop hotel

archways and window openings give the appearance of thick

renovated by AB Design Studio into the boutique Hotel Indigo,

adobe walls. The architecture pays homage to its setting in the

which opened in 2012. The architects designed a passageway

city's El Pueblo Viejo historic district, where the buildings are

between the hotel and the museum to connect the two buildings

largely influenced by the white-washed cities of Andalusia in

and allow school groups to queue before entering MOXI.

southern Spain. Beyond the arched entranceway, light-filled,

Massive steelwork was required to frame the building, and

open galleries serve as neutral backdrops to kinetic, interactive

ceiling trusses and beams were left exposed in some areas to

exhibitions for learning about science, technology, engineering,

evidence the museum's emphasis on technology. LED lighting in

art, and math (STEAM education) on two adaptable floors and

coves between the walls and ceilings accents the strong lines of

a rooftop sky garden. The outdoor terrace, with access to a

the interior architecture.

lookout at the top of the tower, offers panoramic views of the
ocean, city, and mountains.

Countering this rational structure is the sweeping,
curvaceous staircase within the tower. This dramatic element

The sandcastle look of the building had been set years ago

connects the first and second floors, and is designed to evoke

for this project, which was conceived in 1990 as a children's

sand swirling into the building from the nearby beach. To create

museum. AB Design Studio was challenged to develop a robust

the sculptural stairway, the architects used 3D computer

structural system to support the curved, plastered walls and

modeling to plot the bending shapes; steel-supported sections

bring the playful architecture to life, as well as adapting it to

were fabricated in a warehouse and assembled on site. The stair

meet sustainability standards. The museum's shifted focus to

railing and balustrades are crafted from hand-forged ironwork.

http://www.cooperrobertson.com http://www.moxi.org http://www.abdesignstudioinc.com http://www.commercialarchitecturemagazine.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Commercial Architecture June 2018